


written in our bones, it is who we are

by Homosexy



Category: Pitch Perfect (Movies)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Anon Prompt, F/F, Minor Angst, bechloe - Freeform, emotional af tbh, im not okay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-20
Updated: 2016-12-20
Packaged: 2018-09-09 23:10:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,599
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8916748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Homosexy/pseuds/Homosexy
Summary: "Hey what about a bechloe fic based on "I would never change what our past is, written in our bones, its who we are" from the son La Lune by Madeon"- anon promptbuckle up for an emotional ride folks





	

**Author's Note:**

> okay this is probably so not what you had in mind anon but my brain came up with this so I hope you do enjoy it. I actually didn't know this song before, so thanks! I had a listen and read the whole lyrics to try and get a better feel. Also nobody asked but no, I will not stop spelling things the British way, so take your colour and humour and honour and suck it. Hope you enjoy.

Three days and they would all leave. Three days and it would be a hell of a long time before Beca saw any of the Bellas again.

That wasn't technically true. She and Chloe were both moving to New York- they were literally going to be sharing an apartment- but there was first a one month break, in which Beca was going to stay with her dad for a bit and take a (no doubt tedious waitressing) job to get ahead on the financial game. Chloe would also be going to see her family, although she was a lot more excited by the prospect of reuniting with her relatives than Beca. 

Chloe shifted in her sleep and murmured something incomprehensible, before adorably scrunching up her nose. They needed to talk before moving in, Beca knew. Not just any old talk: a Talk with a Capital T. The darkened ceiling gave no response to her feeble attempt at humour. She knew Chloe would have laughed.

She was probably just as scared to leave Barden as Chloe was. As much as she had previously berated her best friend, Beca knew that she too had buried her head in the sand, become engrossed in her friends, and worlds and... everything else. This place had become a sort of sanctuary, despite her initial loathing of it and the only thing that felt safer than Barden University was Chloe's arms.

Which was exactly her problem.  
  
Initially, she'd decided to live with it until it went away. But evidently life had other, more annoying and difficult plans for her. It threw her and Chloe into a party that would have been almost like any other, except for the asshole who kept hitting on her "now she wasn't Jesse's bit of turf anymore". That phrasing nearly made her upchuck right there, which she was sure would have deterred him. Instead, Chloe hadn't even hesitated and immediately swooped in to kiss Beca, leaving Jerkface speechless. That had been only two weeks ago and it hadn't exactly ended there. The party ended, Beca and Chloe ended up in Chloe's bed and, now they were actually alone (and somewhere distinctly more comfortable than a tent), she repeated that experimentation line from the retreat. With nobody to see, or disturb, Beca had dispensed with a verbal response. She knew she shouldn't have done it from the moment she started kissing Chloe, that it was by far the worst decision she had ever made because in that moment she knew she would never not want to kiss Chloe.

Nothing more happened after that night, which was entirely to do with the prep for worlds. But Beca span a different tale, wholly convincing herself that it had only ever been intended as a one off and that now she knew what  _that_ was like, she could move on and forget it. Ignoring the crackling tension that lingered between them even worked, for a while. Everyone was stressed about beating DSM, so it seemed natural that her and Chloe might be acting just a little more odd than usual. But then, worlds was over. Stacie poutily asked if they'd fallen out, before declaring it would be "the worst thing to happen since I got chlamydia" and then shrugging because she figured that a months break would be just the breath of fresh air needed to reunite the two.

The other Bellas noticing made Beca realize she should probably do  _something_ , since in a month she and Chloe would be living together. So, two nights before graduation, she was lying awake at an unreasonable hour, in Chloe's bed because Chloe was finishing  _Jessica Jones_ and even though Beca was way ahead of her on that one, she watched every episode with Chloe anyway. She was so tired, she knew she needed to sleep. But instead Beca stared at the ceiling as though it might reveal her own soul to her at any moment. 

It wasn't even a question of knowing what to do; it was a question of actually doing it without passing out from fear, or awkwardness.  _Tomorrow_ , Beca decided for the fifth night in a row.

Unfortunately, tomorrow went very badly.

Now that worlds was over, all the stress about Chloe that Beca had postponed in light of more important circumstances came flooding back. She was irritable and snappish, to the point that everyone except Chloe avoided her because she was the only one who could so much as breathe in Beca's presence without getting her head chewed off when Beca was like this

"Can you turn your music down Chlo? Running a headache here" Beca asked, a little too irritably  
"Are you kidding? I can barely hear it and you're on the other side of the room. It's on a 6 and you know I never put the volume below 10"  
"Well it's still too loud"  
"Are you okay? I know your hearing gets super sensitive when you're tired, or stressed" Chloe approached Beca with a concerned look on her face, "Maybe you should take a break from your mixing, or-"  
"Can you just back off? I'm fine!" Beca didn't know why the kindness, or the fact that Chloe knew her so well that she recognized when Beca's hearing could become too much for her to handle, made her want to snap, but her voice was becoming dangerously loud and shrill  
"I'm just trying to help-"  
"Well maybe I don't want you to help!" Beca screamed, her whole body visibly shaking, "Maybe you can take your shitty fucking music and fuck off somewhere else in the house where I can't see or hear you so I can be at peace for once in my goddamn life!"

Beca felt terrible afterwards. Chloe had started to leave before Beca had finished, hiding her face (which meant nothing good). Nobody even dared to peep round the door for 45 minutes, until Amy tentatively offered Beca some apple juice, which was tersely accepted. Chloe had disappeared entirely, though Beca suspected she was in her room. Beca's mixing deteriorated with her mood until the whole thing became a downwards double helix, with each worsening the other. Eventually, Beca slammed her laptop shut and stalked up to her room, glaring at absolutely everything before shutting herself in.

By 9pm, Chloe was still in her room. She'd missed dinner and no music came from her room. She was in there, according to Stacie who had popped in to ask if she wanted some food (Chloe had declined). For all that could be heard from the outside, she could just as easily have not been there at all.

This has happened before. In Beca's second year of college, they'd had a particularly bad argument and didn't speak for four days. Both girls had maintained the red-eyed silence in an obstinate stand-off, until eventually Chloe broke down in rehearsals and Beca couldn't bear it any more. She'd swept her best friend into an enormous, teary hug and both of them declared themselves idiots. It had been ridiculous, like something out of a movie.

Beca didn't have four days.

She tentatively knocked on Chloe's door, a plate of cookies balanced on her right hand.  
"Who's there?" The sound of Chloe's voice wrenched Beca's heart; she had clearly been crying recently, which likely meant she'd been crying intermittently since she'd left the sitting room six hours ago.  _Nice one, Mitchell. Real good job you did there._ Beca thought Chloe might refuse her if she said who she was, so she simply walked in and quietly said  
"Peace offering". She waited for Chloe to respond. There was no spoken reply, but Chloe moved and slowly sat up on her bed, which Beca took as a cue to move closer. She placed the plate of cookies next to Chloe on the bed and sat on the desk opposite her. She didn't dare try to actually be near her yet.

It still felt horrible. The air between them was lifeless. Even at the retreat, when they were yelling in each other's faces, there was some energy in that space between them. But this was somehow devoid of anything and Beca felt like it would suffocate her.

"I'm sorry" she said, again leaving it there to see how Chloe would respond. _It would be so much easier if she would actually speak_. But Chloe still didn't reply. Instead, she broke off a portion from one of the cookies and put it into her mouth. That was enough of a prompt for Beca to start talking again.  The dead stillness was still choking her, but somehow she forced her jaw to move  
"I've had things on my mind. That's know excuse for being a shitty human, I know" Beca spoke in a rush, words tumbling out of her mouth and clattering clumsily onto the carpet, "It's just ironic, because what's got me so worked up is I need to to talk to you. Like  _talk_ talk. But I'm scared to do it and it seems I do not deal with that well. We don't have to talk now, it's probably better if we wait, but I'd like to before we leave. If that's okay with you, I mean"  
Chloe had now picked up a whole cookie and was nibbling it like a hamster. She nodded and for the first time looked properly at Beca. Her eyes were obviously red and Beca felt another jolt of guilt.  
"It's okay if you don't want to say anything to me right now, I get it. But hopefully we can be cool again by graduation? It's supposed to be one of the best days of our lives, even if I'm terrified to leave and I don't want my stupid ass to ruin it for either of us, but especially not you since you didn't even do anything. I probably don't deserve you to talk to me yet, I really was an asshole. I've been a dick to you today" Beca laughed without mirth "All because I wanted to say I-" She cut herself off. It was best to leave it there. Now was not the time. She opened her mouth the wrap it up and excuse herself so Chloe would be left in peace with her cookies, but instead Chloe suddenly got up and hugged Beca hard. It was slightly painful, but Beca didn't care. She knew this hug.

The first time was when she came back from jail. Chloe hugged her so heard it knocked the breath out of her and then made Beca's freshman self quite uncomfortable because she'd never experienced a hug that long. She'd counted. 17 seconds. 

She'd had a particularly rough argument with her dad early in her second year, who managed to insult her, her relationship, and her sexual preferences all in one sentence. Beca had screamed curses at him as she left. She didn't feel like talking to Jesse though. Instead, she went to Chloe and after relaying a lot more information about her teenage years than she'd told, well, anyone, Chloe had given her that hug again. 21 seconds.

Then of course, there was the spectacular row of Beca's sophomore year. 23 seconds. 

After Beca had been freed from the bear trap, Chloe was in fact crying. Her emotions were a whirl of guilt, relief, triumph and happiness. She swept Beca into a tight hug quite suddenly and for the first time Beca had hugged her back just as hard, because she really had thought she was going to die as she hurtled all of eleven feet towards the ground. 28 seconds.

Chloe's arms were wrapped tightly around Beca and she had buried her face into Beca's shoulder. Beca gently wrapped her arms around Chloe and waited for the hug to end on her best friend's terms.

34 seconds.

"Are we good then?" Beca asked, attempting to mentally force the tears back into their ducts  
"Yeah" Chloe finally spoke and Beca hadn't realized how stiff she had been until now, as she felt all the tension drain from her body. They'd made up. She hadn't ruined graduation. Everything felt a lot better now  
"I'm sorry" Beca repeated, "I shouldn't take stuff out on you" she touched her forehead against Chloe's for a second. A tiny part of her brain protested feebly, knew that later this intimacy was going to haunt her, but that wasn't important.  
"So," Chloe sat back down on her bed, somehow pulling Beca to sit down beside her, "What do we need to talk about?"  
"Come on Chlo, it can wait. It's late and we just made up, isn't that enough for one night?"  
"It's only ten-thiry. Besides we're both already emotional and I bet you've been putting this off for about a week so this is clearly the perfect time" Chloe announced and that was how Beca knew Chloe really was back to her usual self. That, or the criminally large bite she took out her third cookie.  
"Maybe but... I'm still nervous about it" Beca admitted, not looking at Chloe, "It's pretty important stuff"

With most people, Beca avoided eye-contact as far as she could, but Chloe was close enough that it never even crossed her mind. Until she had to talk about something like this.

"I wanted to talk about what happened a couple weeks ago" Beca began, with no idea how she was going to get from here to where she wanted to go, or where she might end up on the way  
"Which bit? Worlds? That one interview? Gail hitting on me?" Chloe laughed. It might have been weird for her to be so light-hearted, but Beca knew it was for her benefit. Chloe did it to try and help her relax.  
"Nope, before that. I mean the party"  
"The one where I nearly decked that Treble man-bro-dude?"  
"It's  _dudebro_ " Beca laughed, "But yes, that would be the party"  
"Well, go on then"  
"So you know... you know how, we, that we, um, you know?" Beca was moving her hands round in circles to attempt to convey her point  
"I'm afraid I don't know Miss Mitchell, you're going to have to be clearer" Chloe teased, her eyes betraying the otherwise perfect picture of innocence  
"Can you please humour me, just this once?"  
"Fine" Chloe rolled her eyes entirely out of affection, not derision, "I know  _that we, um, you know_ 'd. What's up?"  
"Well obviously it only happened the once" Beca was rushing her words again, "And I put that down to it being just a one-off thing, because... well it isn't important, anyway, where was... the others thought we were being weird around each other though and also sometimes the way you act, I... I just need to be clear on what is going on and what is or isn't going to happen. That's all" Beca finished, drawing deep, shaky breaths. Hands down, scariest moment of her life.  
"This is because we're going to be moving in together?"  
"Yup. I know boundaries aren't your forte Chlo, but I'm sure you can manage" Beca smirked  
"That is entirely unjust"  
"Shower" Beca countered  
"Fair. I guess I just want to know what you want to happen"  
"Chloe-"  
"Because if I say something Beca, you will absolutely go along with it without even asking"  
"I won't"  
"Remember when you put Love on Top in the Bellas mix?"  
"It was a good suggestion in the long run"  
"I still heard you grumbling about it but you put it in anyway because you didn't want to upset anyone"  
"You're just the same" Beca protested "You'll give up what you want to make others happy just like I do"  
"Becs-"  
"Don't argue with me, you do. It makes me mad, it's like you never want to do anything for yourself" Beca stopped dead. She took a breath, "I'm sorry. I'm an ass and I keep taking out all my stress on you"  
"I have an idea" Chloe said. Beca looked at her nervously, "How about we both write down what we think, then exchange it. That way, both of us will be completely honest about what we want"  
"That's a bit childish, passing notes"  
"Am I wrong?" Chloe raised an eyebrow.   
Beca didn't have a better idea.

_so i realised that i never want to have to stop being able to kiss or hug you. i cant really imagine my life without you in it at this point and i really just want to kiss you and thinking about you with someone else kinda makes me sad. take that how you will, i guess_

**I want to be with you.**

Beca read Chloe's single sentence, so much more eloquent and elegant than her run-on sentences that were rambling at best. Jesus, why was she so clumsy?

"So we agree, huh?"  
"I'm sorry. For being so clumsy and stupid and bad with feelings" Beca looked down, feeling ashamed again. The air in her lungs felt like lead.  
"Hey Becs" Chloe took Beca's hand as though she wasn't quite sure whether she should, and waited for Beca to meet her gaze, "I forgive you. Really. It's okay"  
"I think it might be time for one of those hugs" Beca smiled. Her eyes were far too close to teary for her liking  
"What?"  
"You have these hugs that you only give when something's really important. They actually hurt they're so tight but that's how you know they're special. Don't look at me like that, you're the one who does it, not me!"

Chloe tackled Beca into a hug.

The Bellas were glad that Beca and Chloe had made up so soon. This, along with the chaos of the day before graduation kept them from really noticing anything. Privately Beca wondered whether anything had changed. All that seemed different to her was the lack of niggling questions in the back of her head. They acted the same. Chloe still sat on her lap when there was free sofa space, they still stole each other's food and used weirdly creative insults as terms of endearment. 

Everything was almost exactly the same.

Nothing had happened after the Ridiculously Emotional Conversation. Beca and Chloe were both exhausted from all of the processing so they simply went to sleep in Chloe's bed (again). During the day, Beca thought there might have been more actual contact between herself and Chloe but the nature of it was the same as ever. Evidently Chloe wanted Beca to be comfortable (although this was sort of pointless, since Beca was almost permanently uncomfortable on an existential level, except when she was spending time with Chloe and the Bellas) and was waiting. 

As Amy started to take pictures of the co-captains together (Emily had declared it would be criminal if the two were not photographed together on graduation day and everyone had agreed), the idea suddenly communicated itself to Beca's body without waiting for her brain to weigh in on the matter and Beca just turned and kissed Chloe as Amy continued to take pictures (resulting in one flawlessly-timed snap that was taken just a millisecond before they had locked lips and the excited surprise on Chloe's face was captured perfectly). Her actions were met with whooping and cheering; Beca started to blush as she drew away from Chloe, tightly holding her hand. She knew her own face was perfectly imitating Chloe's electric smile.

It was all working out

 

* * *

 

 

Beca's head had been in her hands for over an hour and she had no intent to move it any time in the next seven millennia. Of course this had happened today of all days. It just had to, didn't it?

Argue with her, ask her out

Sprain your ankle, have the best two year anniversary you could have wished for at home instead of on the ice rink as planned

Of course, the day Beca was going to propose, some idiot driver smashed into Chloe's car.

At least she knew Chloe would live. She had been told that already and that meant she was able to breathe. Her lungs still felt tiny and pathetic, unable to muster nearly enough air for her. Would Chloe be able to paint again? Art was intrinsic to Chloe's life. If she lost that, it would be like Beca never being able to mix again.

But at least Beca wasn't going to lose her. She reminded herself over and over, aloud several times. Nobody questioned her. They too were waiting for news of loved ones they couldn't go to see. Once Chloe was deemed well enough to make that decision, Beca would be allowed to see her. But not before then. The doctor (or maybe he was a nurse), not the man in charge who was stern and serious looking, had taken one look at Beca and been unable to keep from her anything that was happening. He updated her as regularly as he could. He was the one to ask how she knew Chloe  
"She's my girlfriend" Beca had choked out. Her left hand clenched tightly around the small box in her trouser pocket, "I was gonna propose, today, I was gonna" and then she collapsed into tears an was briefly taken away for a short while to calm down.

_Please let her right arm be okay. Please let her right arm be okay. Please let her right arm be okay. Please let her right arm be okay. Please-_

"Ms Mitchell?"  
Beca had been waiting longer than she could be bothered to work out from the time on the standard-issue clock on the wall across from her. She hadn't left the chair she'd been shown to this whole time. Her body was numb and cramped in places from being sat down for too long, her jaw stiff from being clenched. Her left hand still clung on to that little box in her pocket because she had nothing else to hold on to. She looked up and almost remembered how tired she was  
"Ms Beale is out of surgery. We have to let her rest for the night, but you should be able to see her tomorrow morning"  
It wasn't what Beca wanted, but she knew it was what was best and what she was going to get. She politely thanked the man and asked him for the location of the nearest hotel and a decent coffee  
"You live quite a way from here?" he asked sympathetically  
"I just want to be as close as possible" Beca murmured. The man nodded understandingly and gave her the information she needed, along with a friendly pat on the shoulder on the way out

Beca did not sleep. She knew if she did that the moment she saw Chloe would come sooner, but her anxiety wouldn't leave, especially now she was on her own. She watched scraps of TV shows, unable to stand more than ten minutes of an episode, After trying all her favourites and trawling through the three-am fare of TV four times, she simply lay on the floor, staring at the ceiling and it's bright lights. Wishing it would be morning.

After what felt like twenty years, Beca was back at the hospital, waiting again. In the back of her mind, a voice babbled on about all the convoluted things that could have happened that would mean she couldn't see Chloe. She disregarded the voice with force and resigned herself to the last minutes of waiting.

She couldn't bear to walk. How did they expect her to walk the way to where Chloe was? Beca wanted to run, but she didn't know the way. She quickened her steps in the hope the man might hurry up, but he did not and she simply had to place her feet on the floor with more vigour than necessary to try and contain her impatience. It would be a miracle if she didn't explode at this rate.

She practically leaped through the door. There was Chloe- pale but alive, battered but smiling broadly and taking in Beca with her eyes like she hadn't seen her for months  
"Chloe" Beca all but squealed, rushing over then stopping short when she remembered she couldn't hug her  
"It's the worst right? Hugs are great" Chloe sighed dramatically and Beca chuckled, tears already leaking out of her eyes  
"How is your arm?"  
"It'll be okay" Chloe said and Beca breathed a sigh of relief that seemed to remove all the weight from her body, "My whole right side is pretty much fine, on the whole. Old leftie here" she indicated her left arm, covered by a cast, using her head, "Not so lucky. It'll heal though"  
The very stern and serious doctor stood awkwardly in the background. He never knew what to do with himself during emotional reunions and they made him wholly uncomfortable, His discomfort and indeed entire presence, went entirely unnoticed by the two women however.  
"I'm so glad you're okay, I... I..." Beca stammered, unable to continue her sentence. Chloe smiled softly  
"I am okay and I'll recover, babe. I'm going to be fine"  
Beca nodded, now fully crying  
"I'm sorry I worried you so much"  
"Jeez, I should be reassuring you" Beca laughed, "Anyway it's not your fault, it's the jerkass who slammed into you. But that doesn't matter, you're safe. You're safe"  
"Seven"  
"What?"  
"You've said that seven times and you have been in here for five minutes" Chloe said and Beca laughed a little  
"I love you" Her eyes were red, over-bright and grievously shadowed by her lack of sleep, but Chloe didn't think they'd ever looked so beautiful as they did now  
"I love you too" Chloe replied. For a while, nobody said a word. Beca just gazed at Chloe, who looked reassuringly back, comforting Beca even though she couldn't hold her. The doctor awkwardly shuffled around the doorway and to his relief went entirely unnoticed  
"It's funny" Beca eventually smiled, "You know what yesterday was?"  
"No?" Chloe asked curiously. Beca reached into her pocket. She hadn't had a change of clothes and was beginning to feel uncomfortable in how long she'd been wearing this outfit and was sure she must look horrendous. Nonetheless, she took out the small, black box  
"It was the day I was going to propose to you" Beca didn't even know she had it in her to cry this much, but apparently the waterworks were not stopping any time soon. For once, she didn't mind at all.  
Chloe gasped and Beca knew that, had she been able to, both her hands would have flown in front of her mouth. The expression was exactly the same though; eyebrows arched high in shock, eyes bright with elation and a shocked "O" mouth that was slowly turning into a wide smile  
"This is the last place I imagined doing this" Beca looked abashed, "But girl gotta do and all"

She took a deep breath and looked straight at Chloe.

"Will you marry me?"  
  
Chloe did pronounce the would yes, but it came out more like a squeal. The doctor smiled awkwardly; this was something he hadn't seen before and he was unexpectedly emotional. He turned towards the plastic pocket attached to the door and pretended to organize paperwork in order to conceal his small smile. He didn't want to intrude- not that he could have done. Beca and Chloe's whole world had reduced to just the two of them  
"When you can wear it, I'll put it on you" Beca promised, "I'll keep it safe until then"

 

**Author's Note:**

> hmu at holtzmeup.tumblr.com


End file.
